Tag Archives: education

Internet nowadays is intensively used for communication, information sharing, information gathering, and research, entertain oneself etc. Today’s youth practically lives in the “Social Networks” on internet than any other place. With increasing demand and development publishing, content has become easier and convenient for individuals.

Podcasting is a special way of distributing audio and video content over internet. It is basically a RSS feed i.e. a computer readable summary of the content of a webpage based on XML. The question now is how can podcasting be efficiently and effectively used in education?

For Education purposes, students need more than an audio or video file. However, Including PowerPoint slides in podcast may add value. Other files can also be attached to a podcast using <enclosure> tag. Educators may also like to consider publishing enhanced podcasts. They are smaller in size and are delivered using MPEG4 or WMF files. Podcasts are meant for mobile learning and hence should be designed keeping this fact in mind.

Open and widely accepted formats of sharing information helps students to easily access content on podcast. If you have an enhanced podcast, which is not supported by all devices, one may consider offering a MP3 version as this format is universally accepted. Podcasting should come as an asset to the students. This can be really helpful for students as they have easy access to information, they can analyse and learn at their own pace and time. It can be used as a great learning, test preparation and revision toll before examination.

While creating such learning materials some part of them should be kept recyclable. Hence, during the editing and production process one should keep in mind parts of podcast that could be used later. One should never underestimate the amount of work required in producing a podcast. The pre-production process, recording and the post-production and publishing time may altogether take up a day or more depending on the content being created or converted for each podcast. But it is worth the effort.

Some key pointers to achieve better student participation may include keeping the content less formal with high redundancy, the students should be addressed directly, it should revise lecture content as well as include new material, fun content such as music can be considered to be included in the podcast (keeping legal issues on copywriter in mind) and lastly, it shouldn’t last too long. An optimum length for a podcast may be from 30-40 minutes.

This informal way of delivering course content is convenient, encouraging and motivating. One should consider using it as an integral part of a course as students can gain as much as they want from it. It can turn out to be a real asset for any programme.

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Learning is social…hence can social media tools be used for learning by students?

About 70% of students in any university use social media in class. It is also common with IT savvy teachers. Having a Facebook page for class, group, community etc is very common. But do students really learn with these Facebook interactions? More importantly, what do these pages mean to the students, particularly for academic purposes?

Tutors have experienced that with wide range of mobile devices being used by students, they can achieve greater engagement from students by using Facebook which is easily accessible via such devices. The question arises is how it should be used to achieve learning without compromising academic objectives?

Teachers can use NOTES functionality to update key take away for students after every lesson. This section can also be used to upload pre-reading material where students can read before the class and come prepared. With this approach, there will be more interaction in class instead of one way traditional delivery of lecture or should I say beginning of flipped classroom approach.

The LIKE functionality can be used to gather feedback or evaluation of a particular lecture, subject material, lecturer etc. if a lecturer gets a regular feedback on his/her lectures this would give him/her an opportunity to improvise (if required ) or make his lecture more interesting for students. Similarly, this functionality can also be used for peer evaluation. Students can evaluate each other’s work and give constructive comments learn and grow together.

Engaging students in the subject material and maintaining their interest is the most important task every lecturer has. Use of social media can help engage more students than other traditional methods such as survey etc. Since it is easy accessible students need not put extra effort to login via laptop/desktop etc and perform task.

Facebook sends updates whenever anyone comments, likes, adds content etc. hence this can be used to communicate with students. Students can communicate among themselves and with the lecturer on regular basis. They can even form discussion forums and discuss projects without being physically present with each other.

Lecturers can post questions in form of quizzes to help students test themselves in a fun way. They can also discuss their reasoning for choosing a particular answer and it will form a learning community which will benefit everyone reading as well as attempting the question. Student can post questions which may arise during the class. If in case time doesn’t permit, the lecturer can answer those questions later and all students would be updated with the answers.

Such means are measures of eLearning can help immensely to improve curriculum delivery in any sphere of education more efficiently and effectively among peers, students, etc. this can gradually help to implement flipped classroom approach which is make learning more effective and efficient than preset scenario.

In this era of technological revolution where traditional classroom is gradually changing into a flipped classroom what is the role of the contemporary teacher in the learning of the student? What kind of teacher should a 21st century teacher be?

A traditional classroom is very much content based learning and face to face interaction environment. The physical presence of the teacher is required for optimum curriculum delivery. However, the teaching is now shifting to context based from content based. With the increasing number of eLearning avenues and shift in knowledge base ,the presence of teacher in a class setting is changing to virtual than physical.

In process of creating a virtual era of global community of learners the question arises, if this mode of learning is as effective as the traditional method? This is rather a concern than just a question in my opinion, as curriculum delivery to bring about learning in a student is the whole sole objective of teaching and delivering education. The knowledge being delivered should enhance students’ potential and incubate understanding.

Most essential aspect of teaching is communication. If a teacher has abundance of knowledge but is not able to communicate effectively to the students, it may not be worth the effort. However, eLearning encompasses a range of communication tools to deliver education materials which may fulfil this essential requirement to a great extent. However, the teachers need to decide a tool to teach the students where a meaningful learning can take place.

Now with these changes in the role of a teacher, from physical presence to virtual presence, from communicating by speech to communicating digitally, from traditional classroom setting to flipped classroom, leaves us with a question that how do we reconfigure our understanding of the modern teacher? How best the potential of the students can be fulfilled?

Years after the role of teacher was defined for bringing about learning in the student, the discussion and exploration continues with the change in platforms and shifts in technology, on how best to evolve this role of the educator. Redefinition of a teacher is in process and very much in progress with technological advancement.